Episodes

Toby Southgate: The Big Idea

Toby Southgate on running a 1,200-person agency, what social-first really means, and why the big idea is bigger than ever now AI delivers average output.

Apple Podcasts Spotify
 ·  The Business of Marketing  · S5 E96  · 34 min
Read the interview

"Average is cheap and quick now. Great is what cuts through."

The Conversation with Justin Cooke

Twenty-eight years across creative agency leadership, brand consulting and global networks. Toby Southgate on what social-first creative really means now social has stopped being a channel and become the place where culture moves, why the big idea is bigger than ever (its definition just changed), what creativity has to be in a world where AI makes average output instantly, what it takes to run a 1,200-person creative agency, and the one piece of advice he would give his younger self.

Toby’s career started by accident in Edinburgh in the late 1990s when an agency called Navy Blue mistook his publishing-and-internet background for the kind of thing they wanted on the team. Six years a banker he was not. Through small agencies and brand consulting roles he joined Brand Union in 2007, launched its Abu Dhabi office, integrated JWT’s Corporate Communications and Ogilvy’s Brand Identity Group into the US business, ran the UK and Ireland operation, became CEO Americas in 2013, and on 1 July 2015 became Worldwide CEO of Brand Union as WPP’s youngest network CEO at 35. Four years at McCann Worldgroup as Chief Growth Officer followed, then three years as Global CEO of Forsman & Bodenfors, and from February 2025 the top role at We Are Social.

In this conversation with host John Horsley, Toby argues that social has fundamentally outgrown the channel definition; that the live feedback loop and the truth-in-the-comments dynamic now applies across the whole marketing mix; that the big idea has expanded rather than shrunk; that AI’s real impact for creative agencies is in the workflow gap between good and great rather than the high-level creative output; that running a creative agency at scale is mostly about understanding people are fragile and that leadership’s job is to insulate them from difficulty and let them do their best work; and that the one piece of career advice he would give to anyone starting out is to say yes to more.

Key Takeaways

  • Toby's career: Navy Blue in Edinburgh in the late 90s, then six years at Brand Union (Abu Dhabi, US integration, UK&I, Americas, Worldwide CEO at 35), four years as Chief Growth Officer at McCann Worldgroup, three years as Global CEO of Forsman & Bodenfors, and from February 2025 Global Group CEO of We Are Social.
  • Social is not a channel. It is the place where culture moves and the truth lives in the comments rather than the content. The lessons brands learn there now apply across the whole marketing mix. Authenticity and credibility earn traction; reactivity and inauthenticity get found out faster than ever.
  • The big idea is bigger than ever. The 1990s anthemic-film definition is no longer enough. No brand has the media dollars to guarantee that on its own. The big idea now lives in community participation, in unignorable craft, in work that real people choose to share. The definition evolved. The power expanded.
  • Creativity is not output, it is problem-solving. AI now makes average output cheap and quick. The remaining moat is craft, consideration, who shows up and how. The worst thing a brand can do is be ignorable. The route out of ignorable is great work strategically conceived.
  • Creative agencies are fragile because they are human-first. Toby's leadership job is to insulate 1,200 people from difficulty and let them do their best work. Citizens of the whole: every office serves the network, every person serves the office, and the shared intelligence is the magic.

Topics Covered

  1. 01 Banking to publishing to Navy Blue: a career that started by accident in Edinburgh in the late 1990s
  2. 02 Social is not a channel: the truth is in the comments and the lessons apply across the marketing mix
  3. 03 The big idea is bigger than ever: it just lives in organic social and community as well as anthemic film
  4. 04 Creativity is problem-solving, not output: what AI commoditises and what it cannot
  5. 05 Leading 1,200 humans across 16 offices: fragility, insulation and citizens of the whole

Key Exchanges

05
01 A career that started by accident.

I thought I was meeting a recruiter. I found a warehouse full of people in skateboards, sneakers and jeans. I was in heaven.

Toby was supposed to be a professional cricketer. He went to university for economics on his grandfather’s insistence (art was not a proper subject), spent six months at a bank, hated it, moved back to Scotland, and joined a publishing company trying to sell content online. The phone call that followed (from an agency assuming he knew something about the internet because he had worked at a publisher experimenting with selling content online) led him to Navy Blue in Edinburgh and an industry he never left.

02 Social is not a channel.

We Are Social is not we are social media. It is a comment on how human beings build relationships.

Toby’s thesis from the role: social is no longer a place where brands buy attention. It is the place where culture moves, where audiences set the pace, and where the truth lives in the comments rather than the content. The lessons that were once specialist (community, authenticity, the live feedback loop) are now standard across the whole marketing mix. The brands that show up authentically inside the communities they want to reach get traction fast. The ones that show up reactively get found out faster than ever.

03 The big idea is bigger than ever.

A sexy headline, a funky soundtrack and an anthemic film is no longer enough. The power of the big idea is greater than ever.

The Ogilvy-and-Mather 1990s definition of a big idea (the anthemic film, the killer headline, the soundtrack that carried the campaign) is not enough on its own anymore. No brand has the media dollars to guarantee that anchor format will deliver the marketing goal. The big idea still exists. It can live in organic social, in real community participation, in work that real people in real communities choose to share. The definition evolved; the power expanded.

04 Creativity is not the output.

Creativity is the whole solution to the problem. It is never just the execution.

AI makes average output cheap and quick. That commoditises the bottom of the work and threatens the agencies whose creative product is execution at the end of a process. Toby’s definition of creativity is the way of thinking about the problem, the craft of the response, the question of who shows up and how. The worst thing a brand can do is be ignorable. The route out is great work strategically conceived. Workflow AI to get to good faster; human craft to get from good to great.

05 Leading 1,200 fragile humans.

Creative companies are fragile. Their job is to insulate good people from difficulty so they can do their best work.

Toby’s leadership model for 1,200 people in 16 offices: creative agencies are human-first and therefore fragile, regardless of size. The leadership team’s role is to absorb difficulty, problem and challenge so the agency’s people can do the best work they can in the environment that they trust. He calls the cross-network connective tissue citizens of the whole: every person is a citizen of We Are Social first, then of their office or region, then of the client or relationship they sit on.

S5 E96Season & Episode
34 minDuration
1,200 People Across 16 We Are Social Offices Globally
28 Years in Creative Agency Leadership

"The worst thing you can do is be ignorable."

Hear Toby on
The Business of Marketing
Season 5 Episode 96 34 min
Apple Podcasts→ Spotify→ Toby's full profile→ Toby on LinkedIn→
Read the full transcript
Lightly edited for readability.

Justin Cooke What drew you into marketing?

Toby Southgate A bit of luck and a bit of accident. I wanted to be a professional cricketer. Didn't make it, so I went to university. My grandfather said he would help financially if I did a proper subject. Art was not a proper subject. So I did economics. I got a job in a bank because everyone who studies economics thinks they should get a job in a bank. Six months. Left. Went back to Scotland. Joined a publishing company that was right at the stage of trying to sell content online. A phone call came in from an agency that thought I knew something about the internet. I went thinking it was a recruitment agency. I found a warehouse full of skateboards, sneakers, loud music. Navy Blue. Phil Jones was the chairman. I never left the industry.

Justin Cooke A global perspective on marketing.

Toby Southgate Unavoidable at this point. Brands have to meet audiences where the audiences want to be met. Different cultures, different markets, different paces of adoption. You get to see more than what is in front of you. Moving to Abu Dhabi in 2008 is a decision I am still proud of, because it would have been easy to say no.

Justin Cooke Social as more than a channel.

Toby Southgate The reason I took this role. Social has become so much more than a channel. When you and I started, if you had enough media budget, you could almost guarantee exposure. That is no longer the case. The focus shifts to behaviour, community, routes to engagement. We Are Social is not we are social media. It is a comment on how human beings build relationships. With brands, with each other, across markets. The lessons that used to be specialist now apply across the marketing mix.

Justin Cooke What social-first really means.

Toby Southgate Understanding people, communities, fandoms, behaviours, engagement. The truth is in the comments, not the content. There is a brilliant live feedback loop that some brands jump into and learn from. If they do it authentically, traction follows.

Justin Cooke Brands participating in culture.

Toby Southgate What works is real content real communities are comfortable sharing. People listen to peers, friends and people they respect more than a billboard. Being part of the conversation is where brands make the difference. The brands that struggle are the ones that show up inauthentically, reactively, or out of step with the communities they are trying to reach. Brand strategy means everything. Authenticity comes from the strategy.

Justin Cooke Social as brand building.

Toby Southgate Speed, efficiency, measurement, what is possible in tight timeframes, what you can learn in real time. I am still adjusting to the speed and the volume of output. Creative preciousness is reduced too. Ideas can be born, evolved and refined live without being stuck on a three-month gestation cycle.

Justin Cooke Convincing legacy marketers.

Toby Southgate Hard. Particularly with traditional marketers. We give them comfort that experimenting is the way to learn. Platforms change. Algorithms change. Effective content evolves. Trends move fast. What is cool in internet culture this morning will be different tomorrow. We talk about being chronically online; not literally on devices, but alert to the behaviours and norms.

Justin Cooke Tomorrow's chip paper.

Toby Southgate Always been the case. The best ideas will be the ones that cut through. Cherish the idea that can change someone's perception or create something real people in the real world want to talk about. The fundamentals do not change. Channels do.

Justin Cooke Big ideas in a fast-moving culture.

Toby Southgate The big idea is bigger than ever. The definition changed. A sexy headline, a funky soundtrack, an anthemic film: that is not enough now. No brand has the media dollars to guarantee that anchor format will achieve the goal. The big idea can live in organic social. It can be a huge idea that real communities care about and peel back layers of. The power expanded. The reach expanded.

Justin Cooke Who is winning right now.

Toby Southgate I am fascinated by fast food delivery. Massive competitive category. Deliveroo, Uber Eats, Just Eat. Consolidation coming. Some brands doing it well, some less so. Adidas is a client and I will declare it as a bias, but they do an exceptional job through the line. Brand comms, organic social, tactics, retail, all connected.

Justin Cooke Creativity in an AI world.

Toby Southgate Self-serving but deep-seated belief. In a world where data is essentially infinite, less trusted than ever, cheaper than ever, and where anyone can make anything average creatively, you need to be great to cut through. You and I could make a film about this podcast in 20 minutes and publish it globally. That is execution. Creativity is the consideration, the craft, who shows up to talk about it, how you tackle it together. Creativity is the whole solution to the problem. Never just the output.

Justin Cooke AI in the agency.

Toby Southgate For better and for worse. Slop is real. People are paying to avoid most marketing content. The worst thing a brand can do is be ignorable. For us, AI is efficiency through workflows. Get to good faster so we have time to get from good to great. Better internal organisation. Then output. Client positions have evolved in 12 months: from no AI in execution to careful introduction in scaling, production, adaptation, translation, transcreation. Origination and concepting is process and workflow, not high-level execution. Research is hugely powerful. Synthetic panels, pre-tested ideas.

Justin Cooke A real technological leap.

Toby Southgate As big as the adoption of the commercial internet and the shift from desktop to mobile. Different tools to do the same fundamental job: help brands grow and solve problems creatively. Scary and disruptive, also exciting and powerful.

Justin Cooke Algorithms and brand visibility.

Toby Southgate Two ways. Good media-agency partners. We are creative agency without a tied media-buying business, which gives us an agnostic view. And great creative content. Algorithms change. What gets shared by real people in real communities is great content, great ideas, great craft. The algorithms do the rest.

Justin Cooke Leading a creative agency at scale.

Toby Southgate Creative companies are fragile because they are human first. We are 1,200 people. If they feel good about what they make, about how they are looked after, about their place in the world, they do their best work. Leadership's job is to insulate them from difficulty and let them perform. Our team in Dubai right now is 75 people; every other one of us is thinking about them all the time.

Justin Cooke Citizens of the whole.

Toby Southgate 1,200 people from LA to Sydney. The worst thing we could do is replicate one office's playbook in every other office. The best thing is for every person to know they are a citizen of We Are Social first, then their office or region, then the client. Shared power. Speed of development somewhere is opportunity everywhere. The scale is for the empowerment, not the standardisation.

Justin Cooke The industry in five years.

Toby Southgate No idea. But optimistic. A more egalitarian understanding of the scale and impact of creative industries beyond the five or six big holding companies. The independents narrative has truth in it. About time. Creative industries are powerful, particularly in the UK. Misunderstood, underrepresented, under-invested. Insufficient voice in government and in technology development. Big opportunity to reframe creativity in marketing.

Justin Cooke Advice to the 22-year-old who walked into Navy Blue.

Toby Southgate Say yes to more. I have said yes to quite a lot. The few times I said no I regret. You cannot plan a linear five-year career; you never could. Too few young people now take the risk of saying yes when something feels uncomfortable. Uncomfortable for a while often means it is a good thing to go and do.

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